Eric Eilebrecht

[Quick Thoughts @lthlnkso]

"Hard work" is a strawman. You are not paid for hard work. You are paid for providing something that others want.

Imagine you are clearing a field of trees. You could hire a guy who will use a spoon or a guy who will use a chainsaw. Spoon-guy will take 1,000x as long and 1,000x as hard (at least). Will you pay more for Spoon-guy? He works so hard!

No. What you want is: Trees down. You'll pay for chainsaw-guy to do it, because it will actually get done and quickly and the effort of the people doing it doesn't matter.

Analogously, does Elon Musk work 10x harder than the janitor? No, there aren't enough hours in the day. But Elon Musk gets paid a lot more than 10x. Why?

Because compensation doesn't come from hard work. It comes from providing stuff that people want. "Hard work" is a cost, it's hard, and it's work, so we don't want to incentivize creating more of it. We want to incentivize creating more stuff people want, which is why we do pay for this.

Musk makes systems that produce things people want. Electric cars, reusable rockets, satellites, AI girlfriends, etc. That's why he has a lot of money.

[magnus @magnushambleton]

I chose the green door ninety-three days ago.

At the time, it seemed obviously correct. Not even a close call. The red door offered two billion dollars immediately—a sum so large it would solve every material problem I'd ever face, fund any project I could imagine, and still leave enough to give away amounts that would meaningfully change thousands of lives. But two billion is a number. It has a fixed relationship to the economy, to the things money can buy, to the world.

The green door offered one dollar that doubles every day.

I remember standing there, doing the mental math. Day 30: about a billion dollars. Day 40: over a trillion. Day 50: a quadrillion. The red door would be surpassed before the first month ended, and after that, the gap would grow incomprehensibly fast. Choosing the red door would be like choosing a ham sandwich over a genie's lamp because you were hungry right now.

So I walked through the green door.

The first few weeks were unremarkable. I had a dollar, then two, then four. By day ten I had $512, which felt like finding money in an old jacket. By day twenty I had over a million, and I started getting calls from financial advisors I'd never contacted. By day thirty-one I had crossed the two-billion threshold—officially richer than I would have been behind the red door.

I didn't understand what was happening until around day sixty.

The money, you see, had to exist somewhere. Not philosophically—I mean physically. Digitally. When I checked my bank balance, a computer somewhere had to store that number. And storing the number 2^n requires n bits.

One bit per day. That's it. That's the rate at which my fortune's representation grows. A linear function. Almost comically modest.

But here's what I'd failed to understand about exponential growth: the value doesn't care about the representation. The bits grow linearly. The dollars they encode grow exponentially. And dollars make claims on the physical world.

Day sixty. My balance: 2^60 dollars. About 1.15 quintillion. Roughly 1,000 times the entire global GDP. The number itself required only 60 bits to store—less than a tweet, less than this sentence, trivially small from an information-theoretic perspective.

But money is not information. Money is a claim.

The calls started coming from the Treasury Department. Polite, confused, increasingly frantic. They explained that the M2 money supply of the United States was approximately 21 trillion dollars. I now held about 15,000 times that amount. When I tried to spend any of it—even a tiny fraction—the transaction represented a claim on more goods and services than the entire human economy had ever produced in its history.

"The number in your account," a Treasury official said, "is not meaningful."

"It's in your computer," I replied.

"The computer," she said carefully, "does not understand what the number represents."

Day seventy-five. 2^75 dollars. I could purchase—in principle—roughly 350 million copies of the entire Earth's annual economic output. The representation remained elegant: 75 bits. Nine and a half bytes. I could write my net worth on a Post-it note in binary.
But representations aren't wealth. Wealth is factories, farmland, human labor, time, attention, atoms arranged into useful configurations. And I had laid claim to more atoms than existed.

This is where it gets strange.

The global financial system is, at its core, a system of ledgers. Distributed, reconciled, audited. When the Federal Reserve's systems recorded my balance, and Chase's systems recorded my balance, and the IRS's systems recorded my balance, those numbers had to match. And they did match—trivially, easily, using a handful of bytes each.

But then the systems tried to do things with the number.

Calculate taxes owed. Assess systemic risk. Determine what fraction of GDP was held by a single individual. Run inflation models. Price assets in a market that now included a participant with claims exceeding the value of all other claims combined.
Day eighty-two. The S&P 500 became undefined. Not zero, not infinity—undefined. My proportional ownership of the market, if I chose to exercise it, exceeded 100%. The shares I could theoretically purchase outnumbered the shares that existed. Financial models divide by market cap; market cap now included a term that broke the arithmetic.

Day eighty-five. The International Monetary Fund published a paper titled "On the Representability of Post-Scarcity Claims." It concluded that exchange rates could no longer be calculated because the dollar itself had become paradoxical—simultaneously the world's reserve currency and a unit of measurement that had lost all meaning.

My balance on day eighty-five: 2^85 dollars. Still just 85 bits. About ten and a half bytes.
The representation remained trivial. The reality it pointed to had become impossible.

Day ninety. I tried to buy a coffee.

The transaction failed. Not because of insufficient funds, not because of a technical error, but because the payment system could not determine a meaningful exchange rate. My card represented a claim on approximately 10^27 dollars. The coffee cost $4.50. The ratio between these numbers—the percentage of my wealth the coffee would cost—was so small that it rounded to zero in every floating-point system on Earth. I could not pay because the act of payment required representing a number smaller than any computer could distinguish from nothing.

I offered to pay in cash. I had a twenty.

The barista looked at me like I'd offered to pay with a seashell.

"Where did you get physical currency?" she asked.
That's when I realized: I had broken cash too. The Treasury had stopped printing bills three weeks earlier. Why maintain physical currency when one account holder could—at any moment—claim more dollars than had ever been printed in human history? The symbolic relationship between paper and value had always been a polite fiction, but my existence had made the fiction impossible to maintain.

Day ninety-three. Today.

My balance is 2^93 dollars: approximately 10^28. About 10 billion times the estimated value of all assets on Earth. The representation requires 93 bits. Twelve bytes. Smaller than my name.

The economy hasn't collapsed, exactly. People still trade, still work, still produce. But they've stopped using dollars. They've had to. A currency in which one person holds virtually infinite units is not a currency at all—it's a monopoly ticket that everyone has silently agreed to stop playing with.

I keep thinking about what money actually is. It's not the bits. The bits are trivial; they always were. It's not even the paper or the gold or the entries in a ledger. Money is a shared agreement about who has claims on what. A story we tell together about value and exchange and debt.

I broke the story.

Not through violence, not through fraud, not through any action more dramatic than walking through a door and watching a number tick upward. Just by existing. Just by holding a claim that grew faster than the world's ability to honor it.

The red door offered two billion dollars. A large but finite claim. A claim that fit within the story, that could be exchanged and spent and taxed and inherited. A claim the world could accommodate.

The green door offered something else entirely: a claim that would grow until it consumed all other claims, until the very concept of claiming became incoherent.

I still have the 93 bits. They're sitting on a server somewhere, humming along, doubling quietly at midnight. By next week they'll represent more dollars than there are atoms in the observable universe.

And I still can't buy a coffee.

[Devon Eriksen @Devon_Eriksen_]

Jack Dorsey used to be important, but as of today, he could be replaced with a potted plant.

In fact, if someone happens to have a potted plant handy, this would be a very good idea.

Potted plants, despite their lack of talent, have one distinguishing virtue: No matter expensive a pot you put them in, they don't tend to develop delusions of grandeur, or spout insane civilization-ending communist delusions.

You see, CEOs run companies, and usually own a sizeable chunk of them. Companies make widgets, or insurance policies, or space suits, or web-based bulletin-board systems. Whatever.

They're successful if a lot of people give a fuck about whatever it is their company makes.

Because money is a measure of fucks given.

The problem is that, having become prominent making widgets, or websites, CEOs like Jack start to think they're intellectuals, and fully qualified to have ideas about how all of human civilization should be run throughout time.

After all, he made a website. That's pretty complicated, so he must be a smart guy, right?

How much more complex could all of society be?

There are actually people whose job it is to have ideas about society. They're called intellectuals.

"Intellectual" doesn't just mean "smart guy". It means "someone whose work product is ideas".

And prominent intellectuals didn't become prominent by accident, or by making a company. Or a website. They became prominent because people found their ideas persuasive, interesting, compelling, worth talking about.

Then, when they have ideas about how society should be run, these ideas move through a process.

First they have an idea.

Then they spend more than thirty fucking seconds thinking about all the ramifications of that idea, and how it might affect people.

Then they construct some supporting arguments to convince people it's a good idea.

Then they publish that idea along with the arguments.

This starts a process, a process that is years or even decades long, where other intellectuals respond, there's a slow-moving public debate carried on through books and websites and such, regular people start to decide what their opinion is, and eventually, if the idea is wildly successful, it makes its way into law, or technology, or something else important that people do.

So being an intellectual isn't just about being smart, or being able to publish something so people see it.

It's about the ability to explain, the ability to persuade, the ability to inspire, and, most of all, about the patience to understand that your work has to move through the minds of others in a multi-year process of getting their buy-in.

It's about understand you are not in control.

It's about understanding that your role is to start conversations, not finish them.

So, when we consider that CEOs' job is to control companies which do a specific thing, with a limited scope, working with a bunch of people who have to do what they say or he can fire them, it becomes pretty fucking obvious why CEOs are uniquely unqualified to be intellectuals.

But another important difference between a CEO and an intellectual is that an intellectual doesn't think he's a CEO.

These guys are famous, and they have money, and they think that's all it takes to steer a society, because they don't know what a society is.

A society is not a ship with a single helmsman. It is a crowd, and it cannot be steered by anyone who doesn't have the ability to persuade people to march in the same direction.

When he can't force them.

And when he doesn't have to power to fire them.

So every once in a while, one of these yahoos gets it into his head that he wants a change, typically a really stupid change, like "let's have a 100% inheritance tax" or "abolish intellectual property".

And he has no notion of how this would effect vast numbers of other people.

And hasn't thought about that, can't think about that, doesn't even have the basic mental tools to think about that, because it you said phrases to him like "Chesterton's Fence" and "Wittgenstein's Ruler", he would have to type them into a google search bar, or ask Grok what you were talking about.

Nah, he doesn't do any of the work. He just says "Make it so," as if he were Pharaoh, because that's what he's used to being.

He doesn't understand that he is on a much larger stage now, where he has no more authority, and his opinion no more value, than that of the guy on the bar stool next to you.

An intellectual's job is to be able to change minds and create positive outcomes without having any authority whatsoever beyond the ability to talk.

Captains of industry are unprepared to do that, and they don't understand why people get mad when they try.

Jack Dorsey wants to tear down Chesterton's Fence, eliminate customs that it took mankind millennia to develop, not only without knowing how those customs solve problem, but without knowing what those problems even are.

Jack Dorsey could not even name every category of intellectual property the law protects, without looking it up first.

So I'm not going to waste keystrokes telling you how this is a bad idea, because to ascend to the level of being a bad idea, it would first have to be an idea at all.

It's not an idea.

It's just a want.

It's no more sophisticated than a five year old demanding a cookie, because the only problem in the universe that he is aware of is that his mouth doesn't have a cookie in it right now.

He doesn't have any practice in thinking about how his ideas effect other people.

Civilizations are not held together by abstract political philosophies that pontificate about "justice" and "the greater good".

Civilizations are held together by incentive structures. For every single civilization thing needs or wants done, it needs to have a method for motivating people to do it.

Companies don't have to think like that.

An idea for a company only has to have a good chance of helping whatever team of people choose to work or invest there.

An idea for civilization has to work out for, and contain incentives for, every single person who lives in and contributes to that civilization.

Walking around declaring "let it be so", or "me want a cookie", doesn't change people's minds.

It just annoys them.

That which is demanded without incentive can be dismissed without excuse.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@esrtweet Clearly Coke and Pepsi think this policy would reduce consumption of their products. I guess they probably know their own business better than you or I...

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@RoKhanna @BernieSanders Pharma employees: Bernie wants infinite public funding of our industry? Sounds like job security! ☑️

[David Gaw @davidgaw]

@helaineolen It's a phone. You hold it to your head and talk into it, so no one can hear the other person and no headphones are required. People have been doing it since the 19th century.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@niftytime @growing_daniel @SirSardonic Yeah 1950's America was famously not interested in athletes or prom queens. 🙄

[Hunter Ash @ArtemisConsort]

Vivek has this issue exactly wrong. American individualism and non-conformity are exactly why we invent new things. The robotic striver virtues he describes are great for climbing up existing hierarchies but not for innovating.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@PumpkinPerson2 @LionBlogosphere Rocky? Sure. Superman? Maybe... But Batman and Spiderman are unambiguously total nerds.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

I just can't relate to the cultural argument here. The vast majority of media we were exposed to, growing up in the 80's and 90's, was very explicitly anti-jock, and anti-prom-queen. Remember Revenge of the Nerds? Carrie? Back to the Future?

And the pro-nerd message was clear: Doogie Howser, Knight Rider, Macgyver, War Games, Family Ties, etc. etc. etc.

That message was formative for me, encouraging me to pursue my talents, of course.

But they were wrong about the jocks and the prom queens. They were never mediocre, and did not deserve "revenge" for anything. Jocks and prom queens are inspirational figures, physically manifesting greatness in a way that a Math Olympiad can never do. We celebrate these people because they inspire us to be great ourselves, and demonstrate in a tangible way the attitude and effort required to be the best.

We should celebrate all greatness!

[Vivek Ramaswamy @VivekGRamaswamy]

The reason top tech companies often hire foreign-born & first-generation engineers over “native” Americans isn’t because of an innate American IQ deficit (a lazy & wrong explanation). A key part of it comes down to the c-word: culture. Tough questions demand tough answers & if we’re really serious about fixing the problem, we have to confront the TRUTH:

Our American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence for way too long (at least since the 90s and likely longer). That doesn’t start in college, it starts YOUNG.

A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers.

A culture that venerates Cory from “Boy Meets World,” or Zach & Slater over Screech in “Saved by the Bell,” or ‘Stefan’ over Steve Urkel in “Family Matters,” will not produce the best engineers.

(Fact: I know *multiple* sets of immigrant parents in the 90s who actively limited how much their kids could watch those TV shows precisely because they promoted mediocrity…and their kids went on to become wildly successful STEM graduates).

More movies like Whiplash, fewer reruns of “Friends.” More math tutoring, fewer sleepovers. More weekend science competitions, fewer Saturday morning cartoons. More books, less TV. More creating, less “chillin.” More extracurriculars, less “hanging out at the mall.”

Most normal American parents look skeptically at “those kinds of parents.” More normal American kids view such “those kinds of kids” with scorn. If you grow up aspiring to normalcy, normalcy is what you will achieve.

Now close your eyes & visualize which families you knew in the 90s (or even now) who raise their kids according to one model versus the other. Be brutally honest.

“Normalcy” doesn’t cut it in a hyper-competitive global market for technical talent. And if we pretend like it does, we’ll have our asses handed to us by China.

This can be our Sputnik moment. We’ve awaken from slumber before & we can do it again. Trump’s election hopefully marks the beginning of a new golden era in America, but only if our culture fully wakes up. A culture that once again prioritizes achievement over normalcy; excellence over mediocrity; nerdiness over conformity; hard work over laziness.

That’s the work we have cut out for us, rather than wallowing in victimhood & just wishing (or legislating) alternative hiring practices into existence. I’m confident we can do it. 🇺🇸 🇺🇸

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@KeenanPeachy Exactly! https://t.co/VK31KNorMD

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

I just can't relate to the cultural argument here. The vast majority of media we were exposed to, growing up in the 80's and 90's, was very explicitly anti-jock, and anti-prom-queen. Remember Revenge of the Nerds? Carrie? Back to the Future?

And the pro-nerd message was clear: Doogie Howser, Knight Rider, Macgyver, War Games, Family Ties, etc. etc. etc.

That message was formative for me, encouraging me to pursue my talents, of course.

But they were wrong about the jocks and the prom queens. They were never mediocre, and did not deserve "revenge" for anything. Jocks and prom queens are inspirational figures, physically manifesting greatness in a way that a Math Olympiad can never do. We celebrate these people because they inspire us to be great ourselves, and demonstrate in a tangible way the attitude and effort required to be the best.

We should celebrate all greatness!

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

Yes!

[Peachy Keenan @KeenanPeachy]

Rare but radioactively wrong misread of American culture. The best thing about America is that people who were dorky in 9th grade can become incredibly cool later on. Jocks can be valedictorians and often are. We don’t have a rigid caste system of “cool.” Most great, defining artists and creators are misfits early on. High school athletes often go on to be leaders, CEOs, command armies. Beauty and popularity are highly prized, sought after, and envied for a reason—they are traits that help in life and no amount of cram school or limiting Saturday morning cartoons or banning the mall will give it to you. The real magic of America is that here nerds and jocks, misfits and heroes can love each other and work together to
Make America Great Again.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@plasticonsofa @wanyeburkett Thanks, I get it now. 🤦

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

@POTUS Who did you "deliver" our $11 billion to?

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

"...all they can control and enforce is the border."

Sold!

[Wojtek Kopczuk 🇵🇱🇺🇦 and 🇺🇲 @wwwojtekk]

This nonsense keeps getting repeated. Countries use tariffs when they don't have more efficient tools of taxation, because all they can control and enforce is the border. Reliance on tariffs is the sign of being a developing country, not something that you aspire to.

[Crémieux @cremieuxrecueil]

Properly shading each state based on 2024 election results, the U.S. is a far more purple place than it at first appears.

[Anna Matson @AnnaRMatson]

If you are unsubscribing from The Washington Post because they won’t endorse a presidential candidate, you are admitting that you only liked them because they were partisan.

It’s time to bring back real journalism.

[Robert F. Kennedy Jr @RobertKennedyJr]

This is the kind of inflammatory poison that divides our nation and inspires assassins. It’s particularly ironic since Biden/Harris have just pushed through DoD Directive 5240.01 giving the Pentagon power — for the first time in history — to use lethal force to kill Americans on U.S. soil who protest government policies. If you want to understand a politician, the words from her mouth have little relevance. Look at her feet.

[Eric Eilebrecht @ericeil]

This is a really excellent point